All The Fragile Ones: Part III
by Tiruneko
Summary: Part III:There was a blinding pain that spread through her entire body, a fire that rose in her veins, a sickness that blinded and danced with death, and then, there was an insatiable ringing, a buzzing, a crushing din in her ears that beckoned her to the end of reality, and then- she breathed. "Wouldn't it be nice to... reset? Wouldn't it be nice if everyone else was gone?"
1. Mr God, Bring Me A Dream

_~Book Three~_

_X~63~X_

"_I certainly dreamed I was finite" _

She walks. The ground is wet and the ground is cold. Her head spins. She stumbles. The rain is pouring now. It cuts her skin, like blades. She walks. The air is streaked with wisps of pink and orange. Red tints mar the blue infinities that had sailed above her whole life, the blue infinities she had wished to fly through. The ones that came to her in dreams and bathed her cell in sunlight through the bars and through the dirt smudged glass. It's gone now. The infinite, cloudless blue is gone, replaced with a canvass of reds and oranges. It looks like a toddler given only warm colors of crayons was allowed to paint the sky. She walks beneath it.

It's beautiful.

The ruined city scape, the ashes everywhere, and the hunger. The ravenous hunger. She doesn't want to be alone. She doesn't want to be left alone. She can't. They can't. What was it? What was it she had to tell him? She walks. She doesn't know.

The ocean. The ocean is beautiful still. She always loved the ocean.

It's beautiful.

It's blue.

Clasping the folded paper, the oddly shaped paper in her hand, the girl stops. The ground is wet and the ground is cold. The ruins beneath her teem with emptiness, screaming, waiting for her words. The presenters and everyone else are gone. Maybe invisible, but no, ashes. With the paper, with the paper and the ocean, she opens her mouth and says to the sky-

"Miku!" With a loud gasp, Miku snaps awake, sitting up and clasping her bony hands into fists. Her red eyes scan the darkness to find a mess of blonde and equally bright eyes scanning her face. "You alright?" The hands on her arms relax. With a pant, she nods. Len relaxes visibly. "Bad dream?" he asks her.

Miku pauses. She can't remember, so she shrugs. "I don't… remember," she trails off quietly, blinking heavy sleep from her eyes. It's still dark outside.

"Oh," Len simply says, moving so that he's now sitting next to her on the folded up blanket on top of the cement floor in the old warehouse. A finger taps at hers and she quietly takes his hand. "You looked really sad in your sleep. You looked like you were about to cry," Len says.

"Do people do that? Cry in their sleep?"

Len thinks for a moment. "Yeah. If the dream is sad enough."

"Any sign of Gumi yet?" Miku asks quietly, afraid of the answer.

Len sighs and runs a hand through a long tendril of Miku's hair. "No. That girl, Iroha, said she sent out the 'signal' but that Gumi hasn't responded yet."

"Did Rin…"

"Talk to her? Yeah. She won't really tell us much. Just that she's an old friend of Gumi's and that she sent her 'signal' and brought us to the rendezvous point like she was told. There's not much more that we can get out of her."

Miku looks around the floor of the warehouse. In the make shift bed next to them (an air mattress patched up with duct tape and a couple blood-stained hoodies) are IA and IO, curled around each other like puzzle pieces fitting perfectly together, as if that's the only place they were ever meant to be. IA has her thumb in her mouth and her other hand fisted tightly in IO's hair. His head is in the crook of her shoulder, buried there, and both of his hands are wrapped tightly around her, one pulling at the back of her shirt and the other draped lazily across her neck. His fit twitch ever so slightly in his sleep and IA murmurs incoherently every once in a while.

In the "bed" on the other side of Miku and Len is Yuuma, his hat pulled over his eyes and the other outstretched, as if he's waiting for Gumi to take it, wherever she is.

In the "bed" behind them are Oliver and Rin. Rin is flat on her back with one arm across her stomach and the other gripping Oliver's arm tightly, pinning him in sleep.

In the smashed out window in front of them, leaking in moonlight, is a silhouetted figure of a girl crouched on the sill, a very, very intimidating and _massive _hand gun in her lap. She seems to have dozed off too.

Miku's heavy eyes blink a few times and she yawns, swaying a little as cold October wind blows in to the empty warehouse. Water drips somewhere distant. Len's hand continues to smooth out Miku's wild hair and with every stroke her body feels heavier. Her eyes close and she hears his voice, "Go back to bed" and then she's gone.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

"We need food, Len. I'm going on a run and I'll take Oliver with me," Rin barks, shoving her hands deep into the pockets of her tattered and horribly ruined wind breaker. The strawberry headed girl Iroha chuckles bitterly.

"Looking like a poster child for homeless teens? Yeah, you'll totally be able to lift enough food to feed eight people without being seen no problem!" She raises a hand to high five Rin, who rolls her eyes, clicks her tongue and swats Iroha's hand out of her face.

"Got a better idea, Kitty-Ears?"

"Many, yes!" She chirps brightly, holding up two perfectly manicured fingers into a peace sign.

"I'm _waiting," _Rin snaps. Len gives her a warning glance that she ignores with a huff.

Iroha digs around in the pockets of her red jumpsuit before drawing out a bright pink wallet decked out with multiple key chains all of animated food like a milkshake and a massive strawberry and other charms including a particularly flashy one of a lucky cat with an actual bell around its neck. She leafs through its contents, dropping a few bills and about ten dollars' worth of change in the process. Rin groans as the clumsy girl brightens, drawing out a silver and blue platinum credit card.

"Aha!" Iroha grins, waving the plastic in between her glittery nails. "So, here's my plan. Me and… that one-" she points at Yuuma, "-go lift a car and pick out some clothes and stuff to clean you all up with and then we can go get food together!" She bounces a little on the heels of her massive and very frilly white boots. Rin rolls her eyes.

"You're gonna' go steal a car looking that _that?_ You might as well be wearing a neon sign that says, _'street rat, street punk' _I'd be able to spot you dressed like that from the moon," Rin hisses.

Iroha huffs. "People around here _know _me you ignorant piece of work. No one's gonna' care if a lift a car or not! My boys will cover for me!"

"Whatever. Just hurry up before I die of starvation."

"Rin!" Len finally snaps.

Iroha giggles. "You'd just come back anyways!" Rin utters a low growl and raises a fist but is quickly stopped by Oliver and Len. "You, pinkie, come with me!" Iroha says in a sing song voice, humming under her breath while beckoning Yuuma to follow her out the window. "Bye, bye!"

"I don't trust her," Rin huffs, moving a strand of filthy blonde hair out of her face.

"I don't care if you don't trust her, we need her to find Gumi. She saved us from… that, Rin. Get along with her for the love of…" Len trails off, scraping his hand through his hair over and over, a nervous tick.

A small whimpering noise turns the group's attention to the mattress where IO is now awake, frantically poking at IA's cheek as she twitches and mumbles in her sleep. Her leg extends frantically as if she's kicking and her small arm extends frantically, reaching forward. Her mouth opens and closes like a fish, garbled sounds and words pour out in an incoherent stream. "P-p-p-p… pi-pi… P-Piko!"

"P-Piko….?" Len repeats at barely a whisper. Him and Rin exchange a glance.

"IA! IA!" IO frantically shouts, shaking her by the shoulders. She continues to shout in her sleep "Piko" over and over again.

"Len…" Rin warns at a low tone. "She hasn't dreamed about it since…"

"I know, I know…" Len moves over to IA and bends down to shake her awake. Her eyes snap open and with a gasp she lurches upwards, panting and gasping and with his name still on her tounge.

"IA… Are you okay?" Miku asks gently, crouching down.

IA continues to gasp as if she's run out of air and nods slowly.

"Bad dream?" Len asks.

IA pauses. "I don't… remember."

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

The pain is everywhere. It aches, it burns, it spreads. It's in her veins, under her skin, a vile kind of poison in the veins. It burns and throbs and her head pounds with a buzz like static that feels like it could split the world. It's death. Gumi screams. It's death. And she's not done yet.

Not know, not ever. She's not done yet.

This kind of a life, it wasn't good enough. She can't die here, she won't die here. This pain… the vile stinging the burning the aching the throbbing the blood in her lungs… her limbs won't move anymore and the buzzing is like a siren beckoning her to the end of the world. Calling her to oblivion, the buzzing pulls and pulls and she fights a battle like she never has before.

She's not done yet. Not know, not ever.

Gumi opens her mouth to scream and then- the pain releases her.

The buzzing fades to a soft ringing in the back of her mind. She opens her eyes. Dismayed but only momentarily to discover she's naked and hears footsteps, she starts to move forward. The space is white and also black and everything in between. There isn't a floor and yet she walks.

There are footsteps that aren't hers approaching. They sound like heavy shoes, clacking against the cold and hard and unseen ground beneath her. Gumi spins around. She can't see anyone approaching, there isn't anything. There's nothing.

"Hello?" She calls out loudly.

Nothing echoes back to her with its chilling voice. The footsteps continue. Frantic now, but a lulled kind of worry she's never experienced, Gumi starts to hyper ventilate. The ringing is so annoying. At least the pain is gone.

"Hello!" She shouts back into the void before her.

The footsteps stop.

Suddenly, behind her, there is a tall boy. He's maybe a foot taller than Gumi herself with chin length choppy pale hair, nearly white. His eyes are a purple so deep, so piercingly deep Gumi feels as if he's looking into her soul itself. He's dressed like a dealer at a casino, in a black, fancy vest and, as she thought, has heavy black dress shoes. He also has two earrings, one shaped like a silver cube and the other like a diamond. Gumi suddenly can't breathe.

"Hi, Gumi," the boy says.

"Hi."

"That was… exiting to watch, to say the least. I especially love how well you function on the battle field, you have grace to the likes I've never seen. Bravo. The ending was a little anti-climactic though, huh?" Gumi raises an eyebrow as the boy begins to pace. "Such a shame you're dead."

"_What," _Gumi deadpans harshly. "I am not _dead." _

The boy chuckles. It's emotionless, yet musical. "Yes, dear, you are."

"So, what're you supposed to be? God?" Gumi crosses her arms and huffs.

The boy laughs. This time it's full of humor. "I rather loved your performance tonight and well… everything you've done so far. Such a shame you had to die in combat… the roof just simply couldn't hold after all those explosives your buddies triggered. Wouldn't it be grand if you could… reset?"

Gumi cracks a smirk. "It would be a little… miraculous, don't you think? I 'die' and then a mysterious guy offers me a redo?"

"Oh, darling Gumi…" Suddenly the boy is sitting now, in a deep maroon squared chair that matches the color of his eyes. His leg is crossed over the other and he's resting on his elbow on one of the arms of the chair. "Who said anything about _a _redo? You gotta' think outside the _box _more… how about as many as you could dream of?"

"Sounds pretty miraculous, Mr. God, but I've never been much of a complainer," Gumi says, smiling.

"Good, good. You see, Gumi, that's... that's what I like about you. Always one to seize the opportunity at hand and _run _with it."

Then there was a blinding pain that spread through her entire body, a fire that rose in her veins, a sickness that blinded and danced with death, and then, there was an insatiable ringing, a buzzing, a crushing din in her ears that beckoned her to the end of reality, and then-

She breathed.

* * *

><p><strong>I'm alive! Hope you all didn't forget about me! Sorry this took way, way, waaay to long to finish, but things in my life have been crazy. Started highschool, moved houses, started writing a book (113 pages baby!), went to space (that one's a lie) and other various adventures I won't bore you with! But I'm back now, and that's all that matters. <strong>

**Remember when I said that ATFO stood separately from the other songs in the series it's based off of? Well... I lied. Now I bet you're saying, "Whaaaat Tiruneko you monster!" but, calm yourself, it will be grand.  
>Go check out the other songs for spoilers of what's to come!<br>**

**Happy Halloween, minna! (I'm going as Gaz from Invader Zim! Woop!) **

**~_Tiruneko ;3 _**


	2. Wanna' See A Magic Trick?

**Oh wow! Thanks for all the awesome reviews everyone! You make me feel special inside 0#0~ **

**Glad to be back! And oh gee- look, an early update. For ONCE. **

**This chapter changed perspective a lot and at the very end, flashbacks yay! Thanks to reviewers; RandomNumbers523156, Zhane17, Black White and Superstitious, Awesome D.T, Saints-Fan-12, Guest 1, Lolrus555, Guest 2. **

**I think you'll all be happy to know, over my hiatus I have improved my fluff and romantical writing so expect that in later chapters! Oh and don't worry, I have no intention of having Iroha destroy my Yuuma and Gumi pairing. That's just blasphemous. **

**Oh and from my time on deviantart I've realized a lot of fanfictions get fan art, so if any of you loving people out there have ATFO fan art, PM me the link! I'd illustrate some of the stuff myself but art is beyond me T^T **

**On another note, **

**Enjoy, *throws Gumi in your face***

**~_Tiruneko ;3_**

* * *

><p><em><span>X~64~X<span>_

"_Tomorrow is a lovely day to see"_

The feeling is better than any high. It's better than any kind of drug induced haze and it feels like someone has electrocuted her very soul. She could kill the heavens if she wished, she could fly all the way to Neverland if she wanted with this… And then there's the pain. The blinding, dizzying, pain that makes vomit bubble up from the deepest pit of her stomach and scream in agony because it feels like your eyes are going to burst from the pressure in her brain. It's as if someone's lit a fire in the space between her brain and skull and it won't go away.

Tiny little shocks send shivers down her spine. Something vibrates somewhere and the noise of birds chirping somehow reaches her over the sound of her own voice screaming and the buzzing, the insatiable buzzing in her ears. On an instinct, Gumi's hands twitch and bend and contort, gripping for anything to hold as her spine bends in agony. She can't stop screaming. Her fingers clasp something, a something with a cold and smooth face. A watch. Its faint ticking sends electric shocks through her overly sensitive body.

Blood bubbles up from her mouth and nose and Gumi utters a horrible, depraved sound, a beast screaming, a monster pleading for life. And then her voice is gone.

She can't scream anymore but lays there, tears moving freely down her face and her body twitching ever so often, tiny whimpers and choked out noises passing through her vomit and blood stained lips.

Gumi lays like that for a long time, her fingers subconsciously sliding across the smooth surface of the thing in her hand. Her reset button.

The pain begins to fade and is replaced with… pure and absolute ecstasy. She lays over heaps of concrete in a place where she can't even see the sky feeling so unbelievable fantastic it wipes all traces of the agony she had faced away with the wind. Gumi opens her mouth and laughs.

With the electric current in her veins carrying her, she manages to work her way out of the precariously perched heaps of rubble from the city at the mouth of God. The city she tore down. So what does that make her?

Her clothes are all but ruined, burned and ripped and mostly gone. Any other time this would bother her considering her scars are exposed to air but as she continues to scramble wildly like an animal through the piles of rubble towards the surface, it doesn't matter. Her mouth practically waters and her lungs inflate with oxygen. She can practically hear them, she can hear her own heart, she can hear her own blood flowing.

Ecstasy.

The feeling of freefalling courses like a disease through her as Gumi takes off running in the middle of night, spinning, twirling half-naked in the streets, smeared with dirt and blood, a sleek black watch in her left hand. She stops to inspect it under a street light. There are no numbers or numerals or any kind of markings on the watch. There are three hands, but only the second hand moves. In the very center of the watch is a small silver cube. Gumi is overcome with the desire to touch it. It reminds her of the ear-ring Mr. Not-God wore.

Her emerald eyes widen and a smirk spreads her face wide. "I DIED!" She screams at the top of her lungs, swinging around the street land by one hand, laughing manically like nothing else could be better. She bends over and practically leaps into the air screaming, "WELCOME BACK, GUMI! WORLD SAYS, HELLO!"

She can't even process anything but a ravenous hunger and the energy she has. Gumi leaps off the street lamp and runs, runs, dashes madly through the street. She nearly doubles over some very confused and panicked looking people. One of which stops her entirely. Her eyes widen and as the man hurries away, Gumi turns on a pivot and grabs him by the collar of his expensive dress shirt.

"Wallet," she whispers, smiling madly.

Ten minutes later with bruised knuckles and a fist full of cash and credit cards, Gumi resumes her mad dash down a shady part of the city. Her eyes grow to the size of saucers upon running past a gun store closed for the night. Gumi dashes into an alley and pulls the metal lid off of a trashcan, throwing it with immense force like a Frisbee into the window of the gun store. Glass shards illuminated like glitter with buzzing neon city lights rain down on her and Gumi thrusts her hands upwards, twirling in it before jumping into her opened window.

Hopping over the counter and using a silver crowbar she found in the back of the store to smash open the locked display case, she grabs four loaded silver pistols and puts them in what's left of her shorts. As they begin to slip out she finds a dark green camo backpack supposed to be used for hunting and throws as many weapons and ammo as she can fit inside.

Now armed to the teeth and still buzzing with energy, Gumi continues her invisible chase down the street. Breathe in, breathe out.

Ecstasy.

Walking into a large department store with a paper bag over her head with eyes cut out wielding her massive guns, she begins to indulge in a game of dress up. She settles on a large orange parka with a faux fur hood and black short shorts with knee high black leather heeled boots adorned in all kinds of silver studs and buckles and to the relief of all the late night shoppers and clerks, leaves having only shot out about a dozen florescent lights.

Before she knows it she's also wearing a heavy utility belt with her new crowbar attached and a fancy new silver pair of biking goggles, but she has no idea where they came from.

The energy is starting to burn off but part of her still feels compelled to run like a mad woman through the streets, although the sun is beginning to rise.

A bus' horn blares as Gumi crosses the street in her absurdly large boots. It narrowly avoids a head on collision with her head and Gumi holds up a certain finger in an obscene manner to a cursing driver.

"Oh yes…" Gumi trails off, suddenly turning to face the rising sun, "…the signal." Sliding her thumb over the watch on her wrist, she starts to run.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

Iroha and Yuuma traipse silently into a parking garage, Yuuma silently fiddling with the zipper on his new grey hoodie. It has two thick black stripes running from the armpits down its sides and the lining of the hood is white. His jeans are a very expensive pair of black acid washed jeans and a silver chain Iroha insisted he get hangs from his belt. Iroha is apparently two years older than him, putting her at almost nineteen, but he still towers over her like a giant. Iroha is incredibly tiny even with her white steam punk boots with their three inch heel.

The parking garage is abandoned and Iroha seems insistent on humming rather loudly so that it echoes. They stop about halfway through the structure before she pulls out a pink flip phone adorned all kind of kitten charms, most with bells. She types in a few numbers and holds the phone up to her ear. Yuuma opens his mouth to speak but Iroha cuts him off with a hand in his face and a shake of her head.

As the phone rings she applies two more layers of bright pink lip gloss flavored like bubble gum and when she chirps out an abrupt and loud, "_Hi!" _it startles him so much he jumps.

"Mhm… Mm… wait level what now? Yeah I'm _there._ Mhm…" Iroha begins to turn slowly until she spots a car parked in the darkest corner of the parking garage. "Op! There it…" as she starts to approach, she stops. "What," she deadpans in a voice void of emotion. "Oh yes, I found the car… No, no I am not _happy!_" Iroha scoffs loudly. "You have the audacity to question me? This isn't the car that I asked for you-" she proceeds to go on a rant colored with such brutal and vulgar language it makes Yuuma cringe.

The car is a silver minivan and he has no idea why Iroha is so torn up about it.

"Fine! Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine!" she chirps in a mock sing-song tone. "Oh no, It's quite alright… Mm… yes, make do with what we have an' all… Mm… alright. Alright. You have a nice day too. Mhm… alright, bye, bye now." She ends the call with a beep and a sigh. Iroha turns to Yuuma and instinctually he flinches and after an emotional roller coaster like that who wouldn't blame him? "The keys are under the right tire, mind getting 'em, doll?"

With a slight nod, Yuuma bends to grab the car keys and hands them to Iroha who hops in the front seat and begins randomly mashing buttons on the stereo. Loud pop music begins to blare from the sound system and Iroha turns to Yuuma, grinning. "What do you want?"

"Huh?" Yuuma gives her a blank stare.

"Y'know," she starts as they pull out of the parking garage, "what do you want? I can get it, whatever it is. Just pick somethin'!" Iroha smiles and taps her nails against the steering wheel to the beat.

After very careful consideration, Yuuma turns to her, his face stoic. "I want a sword."

Iroha grins. "Brilliant choice, my good man." Within seconds she's on her phone. "Hi! Yeah, me again. Listen, I want to cash in that favor…"

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

When Gumi wakes up her head is pounding. She's curled up somewhere dark that smells musty and the ground beneath her is hard and uncomfortable. Something reeks like vomit and she can taste it in her mouth too. A migraine threatens to overcome all of her other senses and with a quiet groan that more or less resembles a whimper, she rolls onto her back, white light surging through her eyes as she tries to open them.

She searches for an explanation but can't really find one. Gumi sits up and her head spins, vertigo swallowing her. It takes all of her will power not to vomit. Something clinks on her side and blindly she moves her hand to it. Her fingers slide over the cold surface of a gun. She lets out another pained whine.

She has no idea where that came from.

Slowly she forces her eyes open, realizing she's in the basement of a library back with the far too damaged books and old newspaper articles only the characters in the dumb mystery novels care about.

_Oh. _A faint ticking draws her attention to a sleek and small black watch on her left wrist. _Right. _Suddenly really, really interested and internally panicking, Gumi searches blindly in the near total dark for anything reflective. Her hands hit a light switch and she stumbles around in the new lighting change, finding a mirror.

"At least one thing's goin' right…" she mutters under her breath to no one.

Slowly, as if afraid of what she'll see, Gumi moves over to the mirror. Green hair, in desperate need of a cut hangs in tangles around her face. Her cheeks and forehead are damp with sweat and her mouth is sticky with the taste of bile. Gumi almost gasps in relief when she locks eyes with her reflection. Green orbs stare back at her and she chokes on an exhaling breathe in joy. _So, not a demon, that's a plus._ She runs her sweaty hands through her hands and unzips her ridiculously huge jacket. The basement is still chilly but with what she can only assume is a high fever, all she wants is to get cooler.

With a sigh Gumi checks the backpack she has with her. Some money and then all weapons. Guns, ammo, a new crowbar that she kisses over and over in elation, and a couple knives. No water or food, to her dismay.

For a moment she wonders how she got here and why she feels so sick, but thinking brings on a wave of nausea she isn't willing to handle. She remembers a light haired boy in a card dealer's uniform telling her she died and an unfathomable amount of pain that still lingers in her temples with each beat of her heart.

She gives her own reflection a weird look before a truly disturbing feeling pulls at her. Where is everybody? Gumi has no idea how far away the rendezvous point is from where she is now, or even if Iroha and Neko managed to get them all out in time…

_Yuuma. _The name rips through her like a bullet and it takes all of Gumi's willpower not to puke again. It's been a long time, a very long time, a too long time since she's had this feeling and it hurts. She _wants _him.

She wants him like she wanted her mother.

She wants him like she wanted a home.

She wants him like she wanted power.

She _wants _him.

It stings her, burns at her and makes her head spin and her stomach churn. God she wants him. The thought of him is like an addiction but it makes her feel worse. She can't stop though. His hair, his eyes, his scent-

Oh god he could be dead, they could have not gotten out-

Gumi doubles over and vomits so violently that against her will a few tears mingle with the acrid liquid. She needs to find out where she is right now.

Because she wants him.

And her brain won't shut up about it.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

"Lenny?"

The little boy turned his head. With a crooked expression he muttered a disinterested, "Mm?"

"Daddy's home," she whispered like it was taboo. It wasn't though. It was just a lie.

"Nuh uh."

Rin nodded enthusiastically, her mop of blonde hair bobbing as she played with a loose string on her overalls. "I saw 'im!"

"You're lying."

"That's what you said was the point of the game, though," she mumbled dejectedly, moving away from the window and letting the curtain drop.

He leaned back against the head board of the bed. "Rin?"

"Mm?" She crawled over to him.

"I don' wanna' play that game anymore."

"… Okay." There was a long pause. "Lenny?"

"Mm?"

"Wanna' play a new game?" Rin suggested, smiling coyly like she does.

Len thought for a moment. "Sure."

"I wanna' play the magic game." He looked at her odd. "Ya' know, the magic Mama said we do."

"Rin… she said no," Len muttered softly.

"But… it's magic, magic's not bad," Rin whispered, punching him lightly on the cheek. He flinched a little and stuck out his tongue. "C'mon, I wanna' try it!"

Len pouted. "It hurt. I don' wanna."

Rin thought for a moment. "I didn't mean _you, _dummy. I meant me."

Len sighed. "Alright, find somethin' we can use."

Rin thought for a second. "Just use the pillow!" She picks up the pink heart shaped cushion. "Y'know, like on TV."

Len sighed again but as Rin laid back he shifted so he was hovering over her. "Okay, ready?" Rin nodded enthusiastically. "Don't try to hold your breath, it makes it hurt more," he warned her. Rin pouted.

"Just do it ya' chicken!"

He pressed the pillow over her face and held it with all his might even as she started to thrash. Only when she stilled did he take it off and patiently waited for the magic to happen.


	3. Out of Depth

**How bout a ridiculously short chapter? You're welcome. **

**Sorry this was pretty late, busy, busy few weeks. Going to a baby shower today and a birthday party so I wanted to get this updated quick. I also am at a point where I need help... T.T **

**SO; here's my plea, I need a brown haired male vocaloid or utaloid. I cannot find one and the internet hates me. So, you, as a kind reader, are being asked to help me pleaaaaseeeee... I need one to write the next chapter! So, if you could give me a name of one you'd like to see please add it to your review you kind soul. ARIGATO MINNA **

**Anyways, here's a short interlude to keep ya' going! Expect fluff next chapter. RinXOliver fluff.  
><strong>

_**~Tiruneko ;3**_

* * *

><p><em><span>X~65~X<span>_

"_In this cloudy metropolis…" _

"Just because I taught Miku how to use knives doesn't mean I'm a skilled blade artist, Yuuma. If you want to learn to use a sword, find a teacher," Rin shrugs, rummaging through a shopping bag for a hoodie to go with her dark green skinny jeans and new brown combat boots.

"Please," Yuuma pleads. "I want to be able to actually _fight. _I've seen how you are with blades, Rin. A sword can't be too different than a knife… right?"

Rin sighs. "Look, the biggest blade I've ever dealt with was a machete. Besides, swords are pretty self-explanatory. Swing it. Go for the neck, head, or legs. There. Lesson complete, now leave me alone," she quips sarcastically. Yuuma rolls his eyes as Rin turns her back and holds up a maroon hoodie and inspects it. He walks around the bag to face her again.

"Rin-"

"No, discussion over." She pulls on the hoodie and inspects her reflection at a distance in the only still intact window in the warehouse. "What 'ya think?" she murmurs at him.

"About the outfit?" Yuuma asks. "Why?"

Rin huffs. "Just… opinion?"

"It's… nice?"

"Wow, smooth. I can _really _see what Gumi likes about you," Rin mutters as she continues to inspect her outfit. At the mention of Gumi, Yuuma tenses and sighs, expression darkening. "If you don't mind…" she starts while picking up her new switch blade and putting it in her back pocket, "I have a date." She turns and marches out of the section of the warehouse, leaving Yuuma inspecting the glittering blade of his katana.

A few seconds later, footsteps echo towards the back section where he stands and a short figure on shiny white pumps leans in the doorway that has long parted from the door. "Woof," Iroha says, shaking her head slowly. "Ya' know, if you're still interested, I've got a guy…" Yuuma sighs.

"Why does that sound so sketchy?"

Iroha chuckles. "Maybe 'cos it might be… Depends how bad you want to learn how to use that pretty little thing…"

"Okay, I'm listening," Yuuma sighs under his breath.

"I have a… guy that may or may not have been causing my boys some trouble and what better way to learn than in the field? I'll have a few of my boys take you on a ride and… when you come back, that pretty little girl in your hand," she whispers, tracing her nails across the blade, "will be like second nature." She turns on her heel and grins like a Cheshire cat. "What better teacher than instinct? And peril…" Yuuma tenses and casts his eyes to the floor. "Look, I'll give you till tonight to decide what ya' wanna' do, how's that sound, pretty boy?"

He doesn't respond. Iroha takes it as a yes, nods to him, and makes her exit.

Just then IA comes barreling into the room, bare feet hitting the cold cement and making a slapping noise that bounces off of the walls. Her face is bright and she's dressed in grey overalls over a pink shirt with a pink clip in her unruly and veil like bangs. "Look!" she shrieks at Yuuma, making a small turn like a ballerina.

Yuuma smiles at her. "It looks great, kiddo." He ruffles up her hair and IA fake pouts at him, sticking out a tongue before her eyes are drawn to his blade.

"Woah…" she reaches out a hand and lunges for the sword, grabbing it by the handle and effectively wrenching out of Yuuma's grasp.

"Hey-"

"You have a _sword!" _IA giggles, swinging it around carelessly.

"It's a weapon, be careful," he chides, reaching over her head and taking it from her gently. IA sighs.

"I want a weapon but Lenny said no," she mutters dejectedly. "Like… like… nun-chucks!" she chirps loudly. Yuuma laughs a little and follows her out of the small back room back into the main, open floor of the warehouse. IO is wrestling with Miku as she tries to get him to put on a shirt and Len is watching with faint amusement. Rin and Olive have already gone.

Yuuma locks eyes with Len and motions for him to follow. He excuses himself and hops down from a long abandoned crate to follow Yuuma into the back room again.

"Well? Did you talk to her?" Len asks softly.

Yuuma nods. "Iroha says Gumi didn't give them too much information. The plan was that they helped her break into the city and get us out. Iroha said the plan was that Gumi would stay behind to make sure she took out all the head honchoes but that she'd meet up with us later. She said that the explosion wasn't part of it- that the blonde girl's explosives went off at the wrong time and… she doesn't really know much else. She was told to bring us back to this warehouse and wait until she met up with us again."

Len nods along. "And Lapis?"

"Iroha said that Gumi told her she figured Lapis would be held deeper within the facility and probably not be in the same place as us because of her… ties to the cult. She figured that the head would want to talk to her because she was probably considered a high traitor. That was also part of the plan, that in staying behind Gumi would make sure to find Lapis in case she wasn't… with us. And she wasn't. But…" Yuuma shakes his head. "The explosion… it took out the entire corporate building. There wouldn't have been any other place they could have kept her so unless Gumi somehow found her before… the chances that she survived that are…"

The silence is freezing.

"Should we…?"

Len shakes his head. "No… don't… don't tell them anything." His red eyes fall back on the doorway. "I don't want to… do that to them. Just… _Lapis _dude…" He scrubs his hand over his eyes and Yuuma swallows painfully. "She was the kid of the guy that almost threw Miku off of a roof… She still has nightmares about him but—Lapis, she was… she was just…"

"You really think she's gone?"

"… As much as I hate to say it… yeah."

"And Gumi?" The words force their way out of Yuuma's mouth without his permission. They sound broken and strained.

Len just shakes his head, his voice the same. "I just… don't know."

Yuuma turns over the blade of his sword in his hands, feeling the cold bluntness against his palms and feeling powerless and stranded, like he's been dropped in the ocean by helicopter without a life jacket and he forgot how to swim.

"Yuuma?"

"Yeah?"

"Does she… hate us?" Len asks, barely audible.

"Why would you…?"

"When we found the pictures, online of… _her." _

Yuuma gulps. "No… I don't think she's capable of hating any of you. I just think she was… embarrassed."

"Yeah. Did you talk to her about Miki too?" Len asks. Yuuma sighs and nods.

"She doesn't know anything about Miki. She said Gumi never told them names. She told them they were looking for six though. That's all she knew was the basic plan. Miki might still be with Gumi. I don't… I don't know what to do."

There's a long stretch of awkward and hollow silence that neither really care to fill.


	4. For These Moments

**I owe you all some fluff because this took so long to update. T.T Sooo sorry!  
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**Thanks for all the brown haired vocaloid recommendations, you guys helped a lot! You'll find out who I picked next chapter which might even be up as early as tomorrow... but no promises. **

**Thanks to reviewers; RandomNumbers523156, Saints-Fan-12, Zhane17, Awesome D.T, iDontCare, pseudoCalibrator, Guest, Alice010- I'm so flattered, of course you can! Just make sure to send me the link so I can join ;) That totally made my day, you guys are awesome. **

***Throws mush in your face* Read it, love it, review it, for the _children. _You don't hate _children, _do you?**

**_~Tiruneko ;3  
><em>**

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><p><em><span>X~66~X<span>_

"_It's a premonition of the future…"_

"Where are we going?" Rin asks Oliver as she follows him across a busy intersection. The two blend into a crowd of people, enjoying the chilly afternoon air as they walk. The two don't really know how long they were captured by Demon's Crow for—being locked up really messes with any sense of time—but it's around Christmas now and it can be felt in the air.

When Rin was little she was awed by the seasonal decorations, she loved everything about the holiday. Now it just brings about a dull and empty ache. She kind of wants to punch Santa in his stupid jolly face and tell him to shove all his holly jolly family hallmark bullshit right up his fat ass—though the last time she voiced this Len smacked her for talking like that in front of IA.

Crowds make her skin crawl but thankfully they soon cut around another street and the swelling throngs of last minute shoppers thin a little the further they go.

"Oliver, where are we going?" Rin asks again, a little peeved. He rolls his eyes and tightens his grip on her hand.

"It's a surprise so shut up."

"I hate surprises," she mutters bitterly under her breath. Oliver hears and chuckles lightly, slightly nervous she won't like what he has in store.

"Okay," he says, stopping her in front of a coffee shop and taking out a scarf from his back pocket. "Turn around and close your eyes."

Rin pales and deadpans, "what."

"I'm blindfolding you, shut up and turn around and let me make you happy."

"No. No way in hell," Rin hisses, shaking her head no incessantly.

Oliver, in a sudden motion, draws close to Rin, close enough to kiss her, but doesn't, and instead murmurs lowly against the skin of her lips, his breath drifting across them like phantom touches, "trust me?" In that moment he sounds pained and, against all instinct screaming _hell to the no, _Rin sighs in defeat.

She allows him to tie the brown scarf over her eyes and let him let her somewhere by the shoulders. Rin tries her hardest to pay attention to her surroundings, but finds his touch and scent far too distracting when he's this close and _touching _her. It's _torture. _Before she even knows it they're standing in a warmer climate. A mechanical ding meets her ears and the floor starts moving.

Rin yelps in surprise and her hands fly out, gripping at Oliver desperately. He laughs a little. "Calm down." They walk a little further before she hears a swipe of a key card and a door handle click. The scarf falls away from her eyes.

"Oliver, oh my _god," _Rin gasps as he pushes open the door to the hotel room. The seventh floor suite is complete with a flat screen wall mounted TV, mini bar, bathroom, king sized bed, and last but not least, a grand window that looks out over the whole city. Oliver, smirking, closes the door behind him and slips the bolt in place. "How did you even…" Rin gapes, spinning around and gazing longingly at the TV.

"I _might _owe Iroha a couple favors in the future but I think it was worth it considering I haven't had any time to just chill with you since… I don't know… _ever,_" Oliver says, grinning with his hands in his pockets.

Rin's entire face lights up and she laughs, actually really _laughs. _Oliver is completely consumed by the noise and wants nothing more than her to be like this all the time. It took an incredible amount of persuasion to get Rin to come on a date with him today and he was only finally able to convince her when he promised that it was nowhere public which he has discovered she is terrified by. After some brief explanation of her hated of crowds and restaurants, Oliver settled on this idea.

Still smiling, Oliver walks over to the hutch bellow the TV and holds up a stack of brand new puke your guts out horror flicks that have just recently come out.

Rin practically squeals in excitement, glowing. "You didn't…" She gives him a beyond belief look before launching herself at him, locking her arms behind his neck and mouthing to herself "holy shit…" into the skin of his neck. "Oliver, you… I… Damn I don't even have words…" she hides her face against his neck, embarrassed and bright red.

Oliver chuckles and brings a hand up to touch her back. "I really wanted to do something for you. Something _good." _He smiles at her when she pulls away from his neck.

"Oh my god I love you," pours out of her mouth before she can stop it or think twice. A look of realization flashes across her face and she blanches. Oliver stares at her frozen mid-grin. "Uhh… Um…" _Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit… _echoes around in her skull. "Uh… uh… I-um- uh… don't-uh, I-" _Someone put me out of my misery! _she mentally berates herself. "Uh-"

She's cut off abruptly when he dips in so close to her face she can feel his breath ghosting over her skin, his eye is half lidded and an emotion she's not familiar with shines in it and makes her heart burn painfully. His calloused hands hold her neck gently and for a second she's worried her own screw up is going to kill her right here before she can even enjoy what he's put together, and _holy hell_ she's ruined everything and-

Oliver kisses her. With a startled noise Oliver would have previously thought Rin is not capable of making (because it is the cutest thing he's ever heard and cute and Rin do not fit in the same sentence), she leans into it. Something translates between them in this moment- a kind of desperation and burning desire neither have ever known.

Rin does not find herself to be a person capable of experiencing or being able to indulge in beauty, but somehow, in this moment, she can see the world as not being so screwed after all. Because if she's allowed to feel this, then everything else can just bite her.

Her hands tighten on the fabric of Oliver's hoodie.

She never wants to let go.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

That night Yuuma finds a note taped against the wall where his make shift bed is. It has an address and a lipstick imprint that can only be from Iroha. Sighing and nearly shuddering with dread, he grabs his jacket and sword, and creeps out to the room with no door. In the same little area is a blown out window he can climb through and he'll take a bus to the-

"Where are you going?" IA's sleepy voice asks from behind him. She's clearly just woken up as evident by her state of bed head and bleary eyes. Yuuma flips out in his head.

"Uhh…" He hops down off of the window ledge and drops down to her level. "I have to go help Iroha with something, kiddo. I'll be back soon."

IA points at the silver sheathed katana. "You're taking the so-ward?"

Yuuma cringes at IA's observant qualities. "Yeah. I am."

"Is it dangerous?" Yuuma shrugs and ruffles her hair affectionately.

"Nope. I just feel better with it around. Go back to sleep. I'll be here when you wake up," Yuuma reassures her. With a sleepy and lop sided smile IA complies and wanders back through the door like a zombie. Praying to anything that IA doesn't let the other's know of his deal, he climbs through the window and takes off in a sprint down the street.

It doesn't take long to hit a bus stop but the bus ride is absurdly long. Yuuma does his best to hide his katana from sight, but, to his horror, someone notices. What did he expect? He's on public transportation with a _sword. _

"Oh my God… dude, are you holding a sword?" A girl with purple hair asks. She's wearing a hoodie that has bunny ears on it and her lavender colored hair is pulled into two puffy frontal pig tails.

"It's not _real," _Yuuma tries to lie. He's never been the best liar though and when the girl gives him a lop sided look he uses all of his will power not to cringe. "It's my little sister's Christmas present," he tries to explain. "She's into cosplay… stuff like that."

"Oh. Cool," the girl says. "My name's Yukari."

"Yuuma."

"Have you lived here long?" The girl asks thoughtfully.

"Yeah," Yuuma lies again. "For like… ten years. Not the greatest area but its home."

She sighs. "I hate it here. I used to live on the beach and it was awesome. I worked at my mom's café, hell, I ran the place, but did you hear about all the terrorist activity on the news? There were like… three separate bombing incidents and a shooting at the subway station leading into town. This girl I was friends with… her house blew up along with most of the neighborhood." Yukari frowns, deep in thought. "I don't even know where she is anymore. The authorities and stuff totally evacuated the whole coast after a city wide _bomb _threat came out. My parents shipped me off to stay with my aunt for a while. It sucks, man."

One thought pops into Yuuma's head while she speaks. _Demon's Crow. _More than likely. The bus approaches his street and Yuuma pulls on the yellow wire above his window.

"That's awful. You'll get used to it soon though," he smiles. "Nice to meet you." The bus comes to a stop.

"Yeah, hopefully. You too," she says with a parting wave, and he rushes out of the bus as quickly as possible.

The area is really upper class and fancy, the real expensive part of the major city, and Yuuma hurries off to find the address. Soon enough he finds it, a woman's clothing store on a street corner. While he stands there staring at it in confusion, someone honks a car horn and he turns.

Iroha, wearing a heavily tinted pair of sunglasses, rolls down the passenger's side window of a _very _expensive looking white car. "'Bout time," she huffs indignantly like a spoiled child before gesturing for him to get in the car.

There's a driver in the driver's side, a very tall built man with sleek black hair in a fancy get up, so Yuuma gets in the uncomfortably small backseat. With his stature he has to bend his legs awkwardly to fit behind the driver's seat.

"So… why am I here?"

A shopping bag hits him smack in the face. "We'll be at the hotel in ten minutes. Put this on and make yourself look presentable. No hat." She snatches away his grey beanie. "You'll carry the sword."

The car pulls off, a lot faster than Yuuma expected.

"Um… what am I doing?" He's met with silence. "What am I-"

"I _heard _you, princess. You'll find out soon enough, God," Iroha grumbles, hovering over an expensive red cased touch screen phone, her recently lacquered pink nails skittering over the keys, deep in texting. Yuuma slinks disdainfully into a brooding silence.

A few minutes later, a peppy and bubbly and frankly annoying snippet of a song fills the car and Iroha brings the phone to her ear. "Yes? Oh, so good to finally hear back from you. Mhm?" She waits for a minute. "Yeah, I have some people on it, don't worry." She nods to herself. "Yup… uh huh… bye, bye."

Soon they pull into the lobby of what is, no doubt, a five star hotel. Awed, Yuuma steps slowly out of the car with Iroha following behind him. She's dressed in a white hoodie and light blue purposely ripped jeans. She's holding a large plastic, cat shaped rolling suit case and is wearing massive high heels. He watches as she strolls right into the hotel's lobby like she owns the place and steps into the elevator. Yuuma follows. On the very top floor it stops and she swipes a key card on the door to a room that looks like something out of a magazine.

The entire back wall is glass showing a view of the whole darkened city scape and the hotel room is so fancy a celebrity might as well live there. Iroha points at a door to the left. "That's where you'll change. I'll be in there," she points at a room opposite before strolling off.

Iroha closes the door to the master bathroom of the hotel room and opens her plastic case, taking out a box containing a variety of makeup tools any professional artist would kill for. Carefully she gives herself flawless and gorgeous cat eyes, a modest sprinkling of silver eye glitter, curls the front parts of her hair, fluffs it, glosses her lips perfectly, applies concealer to blemishes, and then starts on her clothes.

She dresses in a perfectly fitted, pinkish-red dress with a kicked out skirt lined in pink ribbons, and white pumps that make her three inches taller. She adds a matching colored bow on the left side of her head and her accent hand bag with a small pistol inside.

In short, she looks gorgeous.

As she strolls out, she spots a very confused Yuuma dressed in a snappy tux with a black bowtie with a sword in his right hand. He looks insanely handsome.

"Care to explain the tux?" he asks. Iroha waves him off.

"Not particularly." He doesn't push any farther.

Soon they're back in the car.

"Are you famous or something?" Yuuma asks.

"No," Iroha states plainly. "I'm simply influential."

Soon they arrive back in the sleazy part of town and Yuuma shudders when their car comes to a stop. They're outside of a marble slab warehouse with about a dozen other extremely expensive cars parked out front. Iroha and Yuuma step out of the car.

"What… I don't… what?"

Iroha giggles at him. "You're serving as my security detail tonight, Yuuma. Stay outside of this door," she explains when they reach the entrance to the warehouse.

"What are you doing?" He asks breathlessly.

"Being influential."

The large door slams shut.

It's almost a full hour later when the first noise comes from inside. Someone's voice—a deep, male one, raises, another shouts and Yuuma almost drops his sword when three gun shots erupt.

There's no more shouting and no one comes out. With a panicked murmur, Yuuma draws his sword and puts his hand on the door handle. _Should I? _he thinks, hands clammy and damp with anxiety. He pulls his hand away.

And then Iroha screams.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

Oliver and Rin walk hand and hand from the hotel in a content, lingering silence. Rin notices how long the walk to possibly the best day of her life had been and with a groan suggests the subway, which has a stop barely a block from their hideout and is not that far from the hotel. Oliver shrugs, he still has some cash left over, so they start in that direction, arguing playfully about whatever.

When Rin lights a cigarette, Oliver doesn't protest, and she shows him her best smoke rings. She puts it out as they reach the subway and gets a little antsy underground, remembering the last time she was somewhere that resembled a subway.

She had to leave Len behind. A shudder rocks her.

A crowd coming from the opposite direction doesn't help the growing anxiety. It helps to have a hand to death-grip, though she'd never admit it. No—Rin's too awesome for that. Weakness? Claustrophobia? Pfft.

Someone bumps into her shoulder and an electric shock hits her body. It's like a jolt of static electricity only much, much more powerful. She stops dead in her tracks and her red eyes lock onto a pair of brown ones.

The boy is just a little shorter than Yuuma with choppy brown hair and almost amber colored eyes. He's wearing a cargo green jacket and has a black touch screen phone in his hand, the other hand in his pocket. His eyes widen at the jolt, he must have felt it too. His eyes travel down to his phone and his mouth falls open slightly.

"Rin?" Oliver asks.

She stares dead into the eyes of the boy, the three teenagers standing frozen on the subway boarding platform.

The boy glances at his phone, and back at Rin.

"You're… this has got to be a joke," he mutters with genuine shock. "You're _impossible._"

* * *

><p><strong>Cliffhanger, whhaaaaat, Tiruneko you monster! Heehee~ Those of you familiar with the song series and stuff will be able to guess with the hint quote at the top of the chapter. But here's some extra help, Look closely at Ikasama Life Game and Reincarnation if you want to figure it out early, or try to.<br>**

**Next chapter will have some bloody actiony brutality, yaaaay! **

**Here's a present in the holiday spirit; I'm reinstating character pole! Vote away! ^^ I will update soon, I swear it!**

**Have a good night, minna~**

_**~Tiruneko ;3**_


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